Exploring the Evolution of Star Formation and Dwarf Galaxy Properties with JWST/MIRI Serendipitous Spectroscopic Surveys

Journal
Date Issued
2017
Author(s)
•
Sajina, Anna
•
DE ZOTTI, Gianfranco
•
McKinney, Jed
•
•
Negrello, Mattia
•
Marchesini, Danilo
•
Roebuck, Eric
•
Shipley, Heath
•
Kurinsky, Noah
•
Pope, Alexandra
•
Noriega-Crespo, Alberto
•
Yan, Lin
•
Kirkpatrick, Allison
DOI
Abstract
The James Webb Space Telescope’s Medium Resolution Spectrometer (MRS), will offer nearly two orders of magnitude improvement in sensitivity and >3× improvement in spectral resolution over our previous space-based mid-IR spectrometer, the Spitzer IRS. In this paper, we make predictions for spectroscopic pointed observations and serendipitous detections with the MRS. Specifically, pointed observations of Herschel sources require only a few minutes on source integration for detections of several star-forming and active galactic nucleus lines, out to z = 3 and beyond. But the same data will also include tens of serendipitous 0 ≲ z ≲ 4 galaxies per field with infrared luminosities ranging ∼106-1013 L ☉. In particular, for the first time and for free we will be able to explore the L IR < 109 L ☉ regime out to z ∼ 3. We estimate that with ∼ 100 such fields, statistics of these detections will be sufficient to constrain the evolution of the low-L end of the infrared luminosity function, and hence the star formation rate function. The above conclusions hold for a wide range in the potential low-L end of the IR luminosity function, and account for the PAH deficit in low-L, low-metallicity galaxies.
Volume
836
Issue
2
Start page
171
Uri
Url
Issn Identifier
0004-637X
Ads BibCode
2017ApJ...836..171B
Rights
open.access
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